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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   36351 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 10, 2023

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To be fair, I did understand where they were coming from. From a young age we're trained to admire the brilliance of guys like Pythagoras, Leibnitz, Newton, Euler, Keppler, Einstein, Et Al. Afterall, why does anyone even bother to study math if not to follow in those men's footsteps and unlock the grand fundamental truths of the universe? In contrast, while the principals of kinematics, control laws, and signal processing, may be mathematically intensive they also come across as very pedestrian.

Contemporary physics has almost always been on the frontier of math, from Newton, Einstein, Witten, and beyond. Physics textbooks are harder than even a lot of pure math books. Pure math is probably easier because physics requires having a full grasp of the math, but also the physics too. You cannot specialize with physics as you can with math...you need to know quantum and macro, which are different sets of maths and theories. To be among the best at physics you cannot have weak areas in either the physics or math.

Same for engineering, like the study of fluid and Navier stokes, which is again at the forefront of modern math.

In the 60s, Marvin Minsky assigned a couple of undergrads to spend the summer programming a computer to use a camera to identify objects in a scene. He figured they'd have the problem solved by the end of the summer. Half a century later, we're still working on it.

This can be done though. This is what self-driving cars have done for a while and are getting better at , even with increasingly convoluted surroundings. Most problems are in a state of "working on it," because what is ever finished? Chess software is still undergoing improvements even though that problem of playing chess at a pro level via. computer was solved long ago (Deep Blue).

This can be done though.

I'ts not so much that it can be done, so much as reasonable facsimiles can be made.

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